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The contrast between two tragedies at sea: Millions of dollars to find the five billionaires, zero for about 500 poor people in the Mediterranean

2023-06-26 15:33:17Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
The contrast between two tragedies at sea: Millions of dollars to find the five
Photo montage (5 billionaires who lost their lives in submarines and a sinking ship with immigrants)

By Shah Meer Baloch and Emma Graham-Harrison, The Guardian

Anees Majeed, who lost five relatives on the ship that sank off Greece on June 14, watched in disbelief and anger as a multimillion-dollar rescue operation got under way for five others lost at sea last week after the submarine capsized Titan.

At least 350 Pakistani nationals were on the overcrowded ship, according to Pakistan's interior minister, Rana Sanaullah. More than 80 people have died. About 500 more people are reported missing and presumed dead.

There is little hope that his cousins ​​will ever be found or brought home. The family is devastated to hear of mounting evidence that European authorities knew the ship was in trouble but failed to intervene.

However, as they mourned funerals without the bodies of the victims lost at sea, a rescue operation was being talked about around the world. His target was five men, also lost in the depths of the ocean, but on a journey they had chosen as an adventure, not driven by desperation for a better life.

Two of them were also Pakistani nationals, but from the opposite side of the social scale to Majeed's cousins, businessman Shahzada Daëood and his 19-year-old son, Suleman.

The contrast between the two tragedies, the scale of efforts to rescue those in danger and the international media's response to the two stories has fueled debate within Pakistan about national and international inequality and the different values ​​placed on people's lives.

"We were shocked to learn that millions of money would be spent on this rescue mission," Majeed said.

"They used all the resources and so much news came out of this research. But they did not bother to search for the hundreds of Pakistanis and other people who were on the boat near Greece. This is a double standard.”

"It is not the fault of five men that hundreds of people died on the Greek coast. But it is the fault of a system where the inequalities are so great,” a Palestinian journalist, who asked not to be named, told the Guardian. "When people point that out, it's misconstrued as hate."

"It is sad that a submarine with five rich people was given much more consideration, coverage and importance than the migrants on the boat," said one of the victims' relatives.

"Millions of dollars must have been spent to save the rich, but there is no such possibility for the poor. Even the Pakistani government was not paying attention to this issue.”

"These differences highlight the unequal values ​​assigned to different human lives, knowingly or unknowingly, by society and governments," said Arsalan Khan, assistant professor of anthropology at Union College in New York.

Safety improvements may prevent another tragedy like the Titanic, but the flow of people to Europe by ship is unlikely to stop without profound changes to the economic system that has led hundreds to risk their lives and die in a journey they knew was extremely dangerous.

"I know one thing: poor people would make this deadly journey again as they are living in poverty in Pakistan and the economic conditions are unbearable," Majeed said.

"Governments would do better to stop this, rather than drowning them on the high seas."


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